Illithid Savant endless brain supply using Polymorph any object

[mctizic]

We have an Illithid Savant in the party. He has been purchasing brains on the MindFlayer black market, which the DM doesn't see as a problem. The controversy is that he used PAO to turn a brain into a Hagunemnon (Protean) brain; then ate it and now he has the Alter Shape (Ex). Some say that POA only gives you " extraordinary special attacks possessed by the form but does not gain the extraordinary special qualities possessed by the new form or any supernatural or spell-like abilities." His defense is that it counts as an object and not a creature so he is allowed to obtain ANY ability from the new brains.

[Mike Miller]

What is the rest of the group? What level of system mastery does the DM have? Illithids savant can be... Problematic... But it can be fine if handled well. Clearly there are issues here.

[Sutr]

Is the savant eating other savants with this?

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Is the savant eating other savants with this?Meh. The best you'll get with that is replacing the ability to get a new ability with the ability to get a new ability.

Eating a high level legacy champion to advance illithid savant into [epic] illithid savant, on the other hand...

Also, swallow whole is a fantastic ability for an illithid savant who doesn't want to kill anyone to get their abilities. A brain is part of a body, and if you swallow the whole body, you also swallow the brain. And nothing says it has to stay swallowed.

Double also, there are two main illithid savant abilities: acquire class features and acquire special abilities. Note that all class features are special abilities, so feel free to use either ability to grab class features, if you desire. Aside from spellcasting, manifesting, and something crazy, like the tarrasque's regeneration, there's not much reason to grab creature abilities, since you can get them through shapeshifting magics.

[mctizic]

What is the rest of the group? What level of system mastery does the DM have? Illithids savant can be... Problematic... But it can be fine if handled well. Clearly there are issues here.

The highest level in the group is 16th level. The other PC's in the group are A huge ogre/demon-thing, a construct (warforg), a shifter and the Savant.

The DM has been running 3.5 for at least 10 years. He doesn't like to house rule, he strictly does RAW.

[mctizic]

Is the savant eating other savants with this?

Yes!

Also we fought Elminster and managed to wound him (of course we couldn't kill him). The savant had a clone of him made and ate the brain, gaining some of the wizards spells with Elminster's casting level.

[Kelb_Panthera]

His argument amounts to "the rules don't say it doesn't work this way." I wouldn't let it fly even if it was unambiguous RAW but it's not even that. He should be glad the GM is letting him get away with doing this for -any- brains that function with illithid savant or even ones that are nourishing to an illithid.

Also, does a hagumemnon even have a brain? It's got psioincs but that necessitates a mind, not necessarily a brain.

[Zanos]

This is the same party that has an ice assassin of the lady of pain and forced Elminster to shatter a Staff of the Magi to destroy himself so the party couldn't capture him, right?

As far as I know brains are objects, and polymorphing objects is, well, what the spell does.

[AthasianWarlock]

This is the same party with the ELC 30 elder evil PC right?

Polymorph subschool article says :

"The target retains its own alignment (and personality, within the limits of the new form's ability scores).

The target retains its own hit points.

The target is treated has having its normal Hit Dice for purpose of adjudicating effects based on HD, 95 such as the sleep spell, though it uses the new form's base attack bonus, base save bonuses, and all other statistics derived from Hit Dice.

The target retains the ability to understand the languages it understands in its normal form. If the new form is normally capable of speech, the target retains the ability to speak these languages as well. It can write in the languages it understands, but only if the new form is capable of writing in some manner (even a primitive manner, such as drawing in the dirt with a paw).
In all other ways, the target's normal game statistics are effectively replaced by those of the new form

So this seems to work RAW, despite how silly it is.

[Afghanistan]

Also, does a hagumemnon even have a brain? It's got psioincs but that necessitates a mind, not necessarily a brain.


The ultimate shapeshifter, a hagunemnon can take on the extraordinary abilities of any other nondeific creature. Hagunemnons, also known as proteans, have no natural shape; they always appear in flux, incorporating the physical attributes of two, three, or more creatures simultaneously. Their forms boil with possibility, and rarely does any attribute last for more than a minute. Even newborns are tides of flesh, ever changing.

Tainted with chaos at the time of their race’s creation, proteans are denied the stability that most races enjoy. This has imbued them with undying hatred of all nonshapechanging beings (they tolerate other shapechangers but look down upon them for remaining in the same shape for hours or even days at a time). Hagunemnons travel endlessly, seeking new creatures to duplicate and new extraordinary abilities to assume. Their xenophobia generally results in their attempting to slay other beings after copying them.

Hagunemnons have an ever-evolving language that changes so quickly that only another hagunemnon can understand it. They can speak and understand the language of any other creature.

There is nothing here that a Protean NEEDS a brain in the sense that you or I would have. I imagine, if they have a brain it would be distributed across the entirety of whatever form they happen to have similar to certain insects, at least for a moment, before returning to a central brain that human's have and flexing anywhere in between that. Furthermore, from the looks of it, their transforming is entirely involuntary probably akin to breathing for humans; We can stop doing it, but we have to think about doing it and if we stop thinking about it, you'll start doing it automatically assuming you aren't dead.

So whether they have a brain or not? Probably. Could a Mindflayer be reasonably expected to actually fit a Protean's "brain" in their mouth? Probably not. But by RAW?


A mind flayer can grab a Huge or larger creature, but only if it can somehow reach the foe’s head.

Yes, they can. But if the Protean, as a free action, decides to become Huge size, the Mindflayer would have to begin the very questionable quest to find the Protean's "head"

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/EPIC_Gallery/Gallery5a/44190_C5_Hagunemnon.jpg

[mctizic]

One body of mine said it is a hard no by RAW.

Because the PAO states "A nonmagical object cannot be made into a magic item with this spell. Magic items aren’t affected by this spell.

This spell cannot create material of great intrinsic value, such as copper, silver, gems, silk, gold, platinum, mithral, or adamantine. It also cannot reproduce the special properties of cold iron in order to overcome the damage reduction of certain creatures."

He said you can look at it in two ways: 1) you can't effect a item to give it other magic properties. Changing a human brain to an angel brain which in turn will give it special qualities. Then some may say "The brain isn't recieving special qualities it is just a brain." If that was the case why would the Savant want to eat it if it didn't allow him to siphon (su, sp & ex) abilities.

2) the spell can't create great intrinsic value. Changing a brain from a human, 1 HD creature's brain, to a protean brain, which is a 44 HD epic creature would be considered intrinsic. Plus the spell cannot reproduce special properties. AKA: protean's alternate shape (ex) or the phaerimm's ability to cast sorcerer spells as a spell-like ability.

Is he right?

[MaxiDuRaritry]

One body of mine said it is a hard no by RAW.

Because the PAO states "A nonmagical object cannot be made into a magic item with this spell. Magic items aren’t affected by this spell.

This spell cannot create material of great intrinsic value, such as copper, silver, gems, silk, gold, platinum, mithral, or adamantine. It also cannot reproduce the special properties of cold iron in order to overcome the damage reduction of certain creatures."

He said you can look at it in two ways: 1) you can't effect a item to give it other magic properties. Changing a human brain to an angel brain which in turn will give it special qualities. Then some may say "The brain isn't recieving special qualities it is just a brain." If that was the case why would the Savant want to eat it if it didn't allow him to siphon (su, sp & ex) abilities.

2) the spell can't create great intrinsic value. Changing a brain from a human, 1 HD creature's brain, to a protean brain, which is a 44 HD epic creature would be considered intrinsic. Plus the spell cannot reproduce special properties. AKA: protean's alternate shape (ex) or the phaerimm's ability to cast sorcerer spells as a spell-like ability.

Is he right?Look at it this way: if PAO can create a creature with the qualities you want, it should be able to create a brain with the qualities that a brain would be expected to have.

Otherwise, just PAO a rabbit into a creature and eat the PAO'd creature's brain.

[Zanos]

This is the same party with the ELC 30 elder evil PC right?
That's OP, apparently. Something something glass houses.


One body of mine said it is a hard no by RAW.

Because the PAO states "A nonmagical object cannot be made into a magic item with this spell. Magic items aren’t affected by this spell.

This spell cannot create material of great intrinsic value, such as copper, silver, gems, silk, gold, platinum, mithral, or adamantine. It also cannot reproduce the special properties of cold iron in order to overcome the damage reduction of certain creatures."

He said you can look at it in two ways: 1) you can't effect a item to give it other magic properties. Changing a human brain to an angel brain which in turn will give it special qualities. Then some may say "The brain isn't recieving special qualities it is just a brain." If that was the case why would the Savant want to eat it if it didn't allow him to siphon (su, sp & ex) abilities.

2) the spell can't create great intrinsic value. Changing a brain from a human, 1 HD creature's brain, to a protean brain, which is a 44 HD epic creature would be considered intrinsic. Plus the spell cannot reproduce special properties. AKA: protean's alternate shape (ex) or the phaerimm's ability to cast sorcerer spells as a spell-like ability.

Is he right?
1) Brains are not magic items. Brains are not creatures and do not have any qualities at all. Brains are objects. Of course you could make the argument that 'owner' in Illithid savant would have nobody in the case of a polymorphed brain, but then you could also argue that the 'owner' of a consumed brain is the illithid savant, considering eating something without owning it is rather difficult. Then the whole class stops working, but maybe that would be for the best.
2) Only if the material is of intrinsic value. Brain matter is not. The spell gives an example of a wool coat, which is certainly valuable, but apparently not in an intrinsic way. The spell is poorly written but I suspect the meaning is that the material the object is composed of must be valuable regardless of its configuration to be barred under this clause. If you melted gold, is it still valuable? Yep. If you melted a brain, is it still valuable? Probably not to anyone but the least circumspect butcher.

[AthasianWarlock]

One body of mine said it is a hard no by RAW.

Because the PAO states "A nonmagical object cannot be made into a magic item with this spell. Magic items aren’t affected by this spell.

This spell cannot create material of great intrinsic value, such as copper, silver, gems, silk, gold, platinum, mithral, or adamantine. It also cannot reproduce the special properties of cold iron in order to overcome the damage reduction of certain creatures."

He said you can look at it in two ways: 1) you can't effect a item to give it other magic properties. Changing a human brain to an angel brain which in turn will give it special qualities. Then some may say "The brain isn't recieving special qualities it is just a brain." If that was the case why would the Savant want to eat it if it didn't allow him to siphon (su, sp & ex) abilities.

2) the spell can't create great intrinsic value. Changing a brain from a human, 1 HD creature's brain, to a protean brain, which is a 44 HD epic creature would be considered intrinsic. Plus the spell cannot reproduce special properties. AKA: protean's alternate shape (ex) or the phaerimm's ability to cast sorcerer spells as a spell-like ability.

Is he right?

No.
The WoTc polymorph article explains

"It works on any creature or object, and it can turn the subject into any other creature or object (but not an incorporeal or gaseous creature or object)."
Yugoloath brains in BovD are not magic items, so a PoA brain would also not be a magic item.

http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20040601a

Further the WoTc glossary states

"creature-A living or otherwise active being, not an object. The terms "creature" and "character" are sometimes used interchangeably"

Only creatures have special qualities, abilties

"special quality
Characteristics possessed by certain monsters (and sometimes characters) that are distinctive in some way. The Monster Manual has detailed information on all special qualities."

The intrinsic value clause refers to making something this is a currency. If it was meant literally, then you could not turn into any creature at all, since all creatures have a gp value as a slave given in Lords of Madness.

"If that was the case why would the Savant want to eat it if it didn't allow him to siphon (su, sp & ex) abilities."

Because that's what the class ability says happens. You look up the brain the monster came from, find some abilities, and write those on your sheet.

[mctizic]

No.
The WoTc polymorph article explains

"It works on any creature or object, and it can turn the subject into any other creature or object (but not an incorporeal or gaseous creature or object)."
Yugoloath brains in BovD are not magic items, so a PoA brain would also not be a magic item.

http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20040601a

Further the WoTc glossary states

"creature-A living or otherwise active being, not an object. The terms "creature" and "character" are sometimes used interchangeably"

Only creatures have special qualities, abilties

"special quality
Characteristics possessed by certain monsters (and sometimes characters) that are distinctive in some way. The Monster Manual has detailed information on all special qualities."

The intrinsic value clause refers to making something this is a currency. If it was meant literally, then you could not turn into any creature at all, since all creatures have a gp value as a slave given in Lords of Madness.

"If that was the case why would the Savant want to eat it if it didn't allow him to siphon (su, sp & ex) abilities."

Because that's what the class ability says happens. You look up the brain the monster came from, find some abilities, and write those on your sheet.

Hey I am cool with the ruling. I agree that he should be allowed to do it but my buddy states.


"That you can't have it both ways. We are talking about a "Brain in a Jar" so is the brain a creature or object. If the ruling is a creature, than it states that you can not gain the extraordinary special qualities possessed by the new form or any supernatural or spell-like abilities.

If it is an item. The brain is dead not attached to a body. It doesn't have memories, it can't activate the scales to make a creature invisible, it can't tell the body to contort to assume a shape. You can't ask it about it past. If you want to do that, then you will have to give it life which means making it a creature.

So we are NOT talking about changing a creature to another creature, we are talking about an item to another item?

Magic or not, the brain he wants to make has special qualities and abilities the previous brain didn't. PAO states; This spell cannot create material of great intrinsic value, such as copper, silver, gems, silk, etc..

They key word is SUCH AS (not limited too). Silk comes from the ass of a creature that CAN be reproduced. A brain can't be reproduce! Which one do you think is more valuable?
Plus we are talking about polymorphing a brain into something with different memories and abilities. Abilities that may need certain body parts to use, such as a flexible body to contort to assume a shape.
Memories of abilities it never had before!
If you did polymorph a Pebble to human it cannot gain the extraordinary special qualities possessed by the new form or any supernatural or spell-like abilities.
A finger, rock, wood, a toe, or any other item doesn't have sentience. A brain is the ONLY thing that does.


This is all up to the DM. If turning a simple detached shrew brain into a huge epic brain with epic abilities is considered extremely valuable or is it like turning dirt into wood?"

[Katie Boundary]

Proteans don't have brains. Therefore, you cannot transmute anything into a protean brain. At best, a protean could temporarily manifest some other creature's brain.

[Sleven]

We have an Illithid Savant in the party. He has been purchasing brains on the MindFlayer black market, which the DM doesn't see as a problem. The controversy is that he used PAO to turn a brain into a Hagunemnon (Protean) brain; then ate it and now he has the Alter Shape (Ex). Some say that POA only gives you " extraordinary special attacks possessed by the form but does not gain the extraordinary special qualities possessed by the new form or any supernatural or spell-like abilities." His defense is that it counts as an object and not a creature so he is allowed to obtain ANY ability from the new brains.


This is the same party that has an ice assassin of the lady of pain and forced Elminster to shatter a Staff of the Magi to destroy himself so the party couldn't capture him, right?


This is the same party with the ELC 30 elder evil PC right?

Wait...

Is this the game that's run by a 40 year old man still living with his parents that constantly forgets basic game rules (like rogues not being the only class that can find traps above DC20), allows the players to do whatever they want as long as it's RAW (yet complains when he can't "kill the players"), and is constantly spewing antisemitic conspiracy theories alongside racist and misogynistic comments? Where one of the players was a warforged nazi from the future and elminster ran away from a child with 26 less class levels than him?

If so, the game you're in has the "living meme" subtype. Act accordingly.

[Katie Boundary]

one of the players was a warforged nazi from the future

Can I join this game?

[CIDE]

Is the savant eating other savants with this?

Not required. I'm still not sure where that interpretation came from.


This is the same party that has an ice assassin of the lady of pain and forced Elminster to shatter a Staff of the Magi to destroy himself so the party couldn't capture him, right?


What?

That's all crazy in the best way possible.

[AthasianWarlock]

Can I join this game?

Yeah, give me a way to get in contact.

[Crichton]

Not required. I'm still not sure where that interpretation came from.


I believe the idea is to get another full helping of the savant's 'Acquire X' class features. As it stands, after 10 levels in Illithid Savant, the character only gains 4 skills, 4 feats, and 3 class skills, from eating 11 creatures' brains, right? (And Lore, but that's not the relevant part here).

If they use one of their 3 usages of Acquire Class Feature to eat another Savant, they can get more uses of Acquire Class Feature from the consumed savant, thus gaining more than 3 class features (or feats, etc). At least that was my understanding of why one would want to eat other Savants, to keep the endless loop of murder-acquired class features going.

[AthasianWarlock]

Not required. I'm still not sure where that interpretation came from.



What?

That's all crazy in the best way possible.

This is such a crazy campaign. One day I'll do a write up on it. Here are some other highlights:

After killing elminster it became a spelljammer campaign. We are currently on Glyth killing mind flayers.

We killed an elder brain at level 14 or something.

In the opening game of the campaign the Nazi warforged used an antimatter rifle on the enemy dire vultures.

Later on there was a PC who just made drugs.

We had a PC that was "the god emperor of Japan" he one shot Bazim Gorog from Champions of Ruin.

The campaign was originally to kill the dopplegangers, but two players decided to play dopplegangers instead and convinced the party to join them.

A player got the third imaskarcana (a major artifact that can cast time stop and dominate monster) at level 5.

Players completed a quest for the lady of pain that gave them like a super wish that let them get anything. One player got a full set of the regalia of evil, another was transformed into a Hulk or Zoretha.

At one point the party had a full blown adult shadow dragon PC.

[CIDE]

I believe the idea is to get another full helping of the savant's 'Acquire X' class features. As it stands, after 10 levels in Illithid Savant, the character only gains 4 skills, 4 feats, and 3 class skills, from eating 11 creatures' brains, right? (And Lore, but that's not the relevant part here).

If they use one of their 3 usages of Acquire Class Feature to eat another Savant, they can get more uses of Acquire Class Feature from the consumed savant, thus gaining more than 3 class features (or feats, etc). At least that was my understanding of why one would want to eat other Savants, to keep the endless loop of murder-acquired class features going.

That's a common interpretation but not explicitly RAW. It's another situation of "Not said so I can do it" and there's no limit placed on the number of brains that can be used to get more skills, features, etc. Basically, they don't need to eat another IS brain to get more uses on their existing. Cheesy? Sure, but so is the class.


This is such a crazy campaign. One day I'll do a write up on it. Here are some other highlights:

After killing elminster it became a spelljammer campaign. We are currently on Glyth killing mind flayers.

We killed an elder brain at level 14 or something.

In the opening game of the campaign the Nazi warforged used an antimatter rifle on the enemy dire vultures.

Later on there was a PC who just made drugs.

We had a PC that was "the god emperor of Japan" he one shot Bazim Gorog from Champions of Ruin.

The campaign was originally to kill the dopplegangers, but two players decided to play dopplegangers instead and convinced the party to join them.

A player got the third imaskarcana (a major artifact that can cast time stop and dominate monster) at level 5.

Players completed a quest for the lady of pain that gave them like a super wish that let them get anything. One player got a full set of the regalia of evil, another was transformed into a Hulk or Zoretha.

At one point the party had a full blown adult shadow dragon PC.

I'm in the wrong campaign.

[Crichton]

That's a common interpretation but not explicitly RAW. It's another situation of "Not said so I can do it" and there's no limit placed on the number of brains that can be used to get more skills, features, etc. Basically, they don't need to eat another IS brain to get more uses on their existing. Cheesy? Sure, but so is the class.



So what you're saying is that via a willful misreading of some ever-so-slightly ambiguous text, and a complete ignoring of the class table (no conflict between the two, just clarification, so no text trumping table), you're insisting on an extremely tenuous possible interpretation of the words "gains one class feature of a consumed brain's owner," to mean "one class feature from each consumed brain's owner"??? And all that despite the follow-on line in the description clarifying that at later levels, you get 2 additional uses of this class feature?

This isn't even a case of "RAW says I can, even if it's clearly not RAI" this is a case of "RAI is quite clear, and RAW has one tiny ambiguity that could be interpreted to either agree with the seeming RAI and also agree with the class table, or alternately I can attempt to exploit the word 'a' as hard as possible despite the surrounding evidence"




Should it have been stated more clearly as "gains one class feature of one consumed brain's owner"? Yes, it should have. But even with the current wording, RAW isn't that you get unlimited uses, and definitely isn't clear-cut that that's the case. When there's ambiguity in the text, as there is here, we use the surrounding text to gain clarity about which textually possible interpretation is correct, and even a cursory glance at the surrounding text and class table of IS shows pretty clearly what that 'a' means.

[AthasianWarlock]

So what you're saying is that via a willful misreading of some ever-so-slightly ambiguous text, and a complete ignoring of the class table (no conflict between the two, just clarification, so no text trumping table), you're insisting on an extremely tenuous possible interpretation of the words "gains one class feature of a consumed brain's owner," to mean "one class feature from each consumed brain's owner"??? And all that despite the follow-on line in the description clarifying that at later levels, you get 2 additional uses of this class feature?

This isn't even a case of "RAW says I can, even if it's clearly not RAI" this is a case of "RAI is quite clear, and RAW has one tiny ambiguity that could be interpreted to either agree with the seeming RAI and also agree with the class table, or alternately I can attempt to exploit the word 'a' as hard as possible despite the surrounding evidence"




Should it have been stated more clearly as "gains one class feature of one consumed brain's owner"? Yes, it should have. But even with the current wording, RAW isn't that you get unlimited uses, and definitely isn't clear-cut that that's the case. When there's ambiguity in the text, as there is here, we use the surrounding text to gain clarity about which textually possible interpretation is correct, and even a cursory glance at the surrounding text and class table of IS shows pretty clearly what that 'a' means.

So WoTc put out an ilithid savant stat block that says that, yes indeed, you get one class feature from *each* of the brains you eat. The class does indeed work as the text says it does.


http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ei/20030608a

[Crichton]

So WoTc put out an ilithid savant stat block that says that, yes indeed, you get one class feature from *each* of the brains you eat. The class does indeed work as the text says it does.


http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ei/20030608a

I'd never seen that before, thanks for showing it to me. Unfortunately it supports my argument, rather than the 'unlimited brains' argument.


Nevermind that statblocks aren't RAW(but they can help show RAI) and that this statblock is already showing errors (SR for Mind Flayers is supposed to be 25+class levels as per MM1 pg 187, so with 16 class levels it should be 41, but it's only showing 25 still), but after spending some time dissecting the various feats, skills, class features and special qualities the Illithid Savant in that statblock has, it looks like it only has the ones you'd expect if the non-unlimited interpretation is correct. I may have made an error in parsing out the various features, so please double check my work, but this looks like it's evidence in favor of the more limited interpretation, as I've been advocating for thus far, and not for the unlimited, 'as many brains as you can eat' broken interpretation.


By the limited (correct) interpretation, counting up the numbers that both the text of the class description and the class table agree to include, an Illithid Savant 14 should be able to eat 19 brains and thus gain:
6 skills
6 feats
4 class features
3 special qualities


After subtracting all the Mind Flayer racial abilities and the non-relevant IS class feature (Lore) from the S'rurrus statblock in the link you provided, the example character there has gained these 18 items from eating brains:
6 skills: helpfully listed out in a subsection as to which ones came from the IS class feature of eating brains

5 feats: helpfully marked out with ** notation as to which ones came from the IS class feature of eating brains, and apparently still has yet to use her 6th feat brain eating to gain a 6th feat

4 Class features - No helpful notation, but the 3 wizard spellcasting brains are listed under the prepared spells list, and after removing the character's own Enchanter 2 levels, we're left with these 4:

Cleric spellcasting
(2)prepared and casts as Wiz13
(3)prepared and casts as Wiz20
(4)prepared and casts as Wiz23



3 Special Qualities - No helpful notation, but after removing all the Mind Flayer special qualities, we're left with these 3:

Frightful Presence
Regeneration
True Seeing





So it looks to me like this statblock has exactly the number of skills, feats, class features, and special qualities that you'd expect if, as I'd previously advocated for, the tiny ambiguity of 'a brain' is interpreted in the light of the surrounding text in the class description, which helpfully puts it exactly in agreement with the numbers in the class table.

Given a lack of any other evidence to put on the side of the textually unsupported 'unlimited brains' interpretation, well, it seems pretty clear-cut to me.

[AthasianWarlock]

I guess I don't understand. When you eat a brain you gain abilities as they class says. He has 3 instances of casting from the assume class feature. He got one for each victim, as opposed to only one instance.

[Crichton]

I guess I don't understand. When you eat a brain you gain abilities as they class says. He has 3 instances of casting from the assume class feature. He got one for each victim, as opposed to only one instance.

Yes, that's right, but the class description (and table) put a limit on how many class features (or feats or skills or special qualities) you can gain from brains, at any given level of IS. So the epic example has 4 different class features (1 cleric casting and 3 wizard casting), but they can't eat a dozen wizards and get a dozen instances of casting, or a million, etc.

[AthasianWarlock]

Yes, that's right, but the class description (and table) put a limit on how many class features (or feats or skills or special qualities) you can gain from brains, at any given level of IS. So the epic example has 4 different class features (1 cleric casting and 3 wizard casting), but they can't eat a dozen wizards and get a dozen instances of casting, or a million, etc.

The ilithid savant on page 78 of savage species has ilithid savant 3 so aquire class feature 1, but then the text has Sugglir with hide in plain sight and sneak attack (2 class features).

[Crichton]

The ilithid savant on page 78 of savage species has ilithid savant 3 so aquire class feature 1, but then the text has Sugglir with hide in plain sight and sneak attack (2 class features).

Sugglir in that stat lock gets HiPS from his 3 levels of Shadowdancer, not from IS.

[animewatcha]

This is such a crazy campaign. One day I'll do a write up on it. Here are some other highlights:

After killing elminster it became a spelljammer campaign. We are currently on Glyth killing mind flayers.

We killed an elder brain at level 14 or something.

In the opening game of the campaign the Nazi warforged used an antimatter rifle on the enemy dire vultures.

Later on there was a PC who just made drugs.

We had a PC that was "the god emperor of Japan" he one shot Bazim Gorog from Champions of Ruin.

The campaign was originally to kill the dopplegangers, but two players decided to play dopplegangers instead and convinced the party to join them.

A player got the third imaskarcana (a major artifact that can cast time stop and dominate monster) at level 5.

Players completed a quest for the lady of pain that gave them like a super wish that let them get anything. One player got a full set of the regalia of evil, another was transformed into a Hulk or Zoretha.

At one point the party had a full blown adult shadow dragon PC.

I think at this point the DM overdosed on Fukitol and is working on a new wonder drug 'Pull-****-Outta-Ass'?

I would not be surprised if you look behind the DM screen and he has no notes or anything. Literally just improvising everything.

[AthasianWarlock]

I'd never seen that before, thanks for showing it to me. Unfortunately it supports my argument, rather than the 'unlimited brains' argument.


Nevermind that statblocks aren't RAW(but they can help show RAI) and that this statblock is already showing errors (SR for Mind Flayers is supposed to be 25+class levels as per MM1 pg 187, so with 16 class levels it should be 41, but it's only showing 25 still), but after spending some time dissecting the various feats, skills, class features and special qualities the Illithid Savant in that statblock has, it looks like it only has the ones you'd expect if the non-unlimited interpretation is correct. I may have made an error in parsing out the various features, so please double check my work, but this looks like it's evidence in favor of the more limited interpretation, as I've been advocating for thus far, and not for the unlimited, 'as many brains as you can eat' broken interpretation.


By the limited (correct) interpretation, counting up the numbers that both the text of the class description and the class table agree to include, an Illithid Savant 14 should be able to eat 19 brains and thus gain:
6 skills
6 feats
4 class features
3 special qualities


After subtracting all the Mind Flayer racial abilities and the non-relevant IS class feature (Lore) from the S'rurrus statblock in the link you provided, the example character there has gained these 18 items from eating brains:
6 skills: helpfully listed out in a subsection as to which ones came from the IS class feature of eating brains

5 feats: helpfully marked out with ** notation as to which ones came from the IS class feature of eating brains, and apparently still has yet to use her 6th feat brain eating to gain a 6th feat

4 Class features - No helpful notation, but the 3 wizard spellcasting brains are listed under the prepared spells list, and after removing the character's own Enchanter 2 levels, we're left with these 4:

Cleric spellcasting
(2)prepared and casts as Wiz13
(3)prepared and casts as Wiz20
(4)prepared and casts as Wiz23



3 Special Qualities - No helpful notation, but after removing all the Mind Flayer special qualities, we're left with these 3:

Frightful Presence
Regeneration
True Seeing





So it looks to me like this statblock has exactly the number of skills, feats, class features, and special qualities that you'd expect if, as I'd previously advocated for, the tiny ambiguity of 'a brain' is interpreted in the light of the surrounding text in the class description, which helpfully puts it exactly in agreement with the numbers in the class table.

Given a lack of any other evidence to put on the side of the textually unsupported 'unlimited brains' interpretation, well, it seems pretty clear-cut to me.

The ability itself makes reference to the fact that the number refers to the number of abilties from a brain, and since the triggering condition (eating a brain) can happen multiple times- I don't see how this isn't a special case of the RAW (which is that when you eat a brain you gain abilities).

[Crichton]

The ability itself makes reference to the fact that the number refers to the number of abilties from a brain, and since the triggering condition (eating a brain) can happen multiple times- I don't see how this isn't a special case of the RAW (which is that when you eat a brain you gain abilities).

Honestly with the unclear wording of your comment, I legitimately can't tell which side of this you're even arguing for.

Yes, eating a brain gains you abilities, up to the limited number of iterations for each different ability type the class lets you gain. After you reach the limit for your level, eating more brains does nothing.


(And in an odd quirk of RAW, technically for your first feat gain at IS level 2, you have to consume the whole creature, but the later feats from levels 4, 6, and 8 only require you to eat just the brain. Yay for bad wording!)

[AthasianWarlock]

Honestly with the unclear wording of your comment, I legitimately can't tell which side of this you're even arguing for.

Yes, eating a brain gains you abilities, up to the limited number of iterations for each different ability type the class lets you gain. After you reach the limit for your level, eating more brains does nothing.


(And in an odd quirk of RAW, technically for your first feat gain at IS level 2, you have to consume the whole creature, but the later feats from levels 4, 6, and 8 only require you to eat just the brain. Yay for bad wording!)

What in this text says there is a global max per level?

"At 1st level, an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain he has consumed, chosen at the time of consumption."

[Crichton]

What in this text says there is a global max per level?

"At 1st level, an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain he has consumed, chosen at the time of consumption."



First, you're quoting the first sentence from the entry while ignoring the last sentence, which indicates pretty clearly that there's a limit:

"At 4th, 6th, and 8th level, the illithid savant can acquire and use one additional skill from a brain."


Second, -as I mentioned in my earlier more detailed posts- while yes, there is a small ambiguity in the wording and they really should have worded it more carefully, the standard procedure for an ambiguously structured sentence or paragraph isn't to leap to permissive conclusions without further thought, but instead to check the immediate context (the surrounding sentences and other parts of the entry) for text that clarifies which of the grammatically permitted meanings is the correct one.

In this case, there's 2 grammatically permitted meanings for the sentence you quoted: One possibility allows for unlimited brain eating for skill/ability gains, the other does not. The immediately surrounding text, and additionally the class table (which is formatted just exactly like many other class tables that detail incrementally numbered ability gains) both combine to demonstrate that no, the brain eating is indeed not unlimited, but is rather more sensibly limited, just as one would expect. This reading aligns with all the available rules text (and table) for the class, while the unlimited reading requires ignoring half the class description text to allow that reading of the sentence.

That alone is enough to seal up the RAW and RAI arguments pretty clearly, but if further evidence is needed, the 2 statblocks that you yourself provided each also demonstrate examples of Illithid Savants that have exactly the number of gained abilities one would expect from the reading of the text that puts limits on brain eating.

It's only through willfully ignoring the rest of the entry that one can read the first sentence and exploit the minor ambiguity for cheesy gain.

[AthasianWarlock]

It's fine for RAI, although fwiw I believe there was an interview with Andy Collins where he basically shrugged and said "it's op but I didn't make the class"

Your statement only grammaticaly makes sense with an ellipsis since "a" is an indefinite article. That takes it from RAW to something else. If you are dead set on balancing it using mental gymnastics it's probably better to just say "I don't like that it can do that so here's a nerf."


It's like if I said pale master lost his vision after level 3 because the text says

"Darkvision (Ex): At 3rd level, the dark begins to lose its mysteries to a pale master, who gains darkvision out to 60 feet. If he already has darkvision, its effective distance increases by 60 feet."

And I said "well at level 3 you get it, but it doesn't say anything about level 4. It's implied in the context."

[Crichton]

It's fine for RAI, although fwiw I believe there was an interview with Andy Collins where he basically shrugged and said "it's op but I didn't make the class"


Given that he didn't write the class, and likely didn't do a thorough examination of the class prior to that interview, and additionally given that interviews aren't RAW nor do they particularly inform RAW, I don't see how that has anything to do with the question of what's RAW here.




Your statement only grammaticaly makes sense with an ellipsis since "a" is an indefinite article. That takes it from RAW to something else. If you are dead set on balancing it using mental gymnastics it's probably better to just say "I don't like that it can do that so here's a nerf."

That's not how grammar works, though... My whole point from my first post here was that the phrase could grammatically mean one of two different things(precisely because of the undefined nature of the indefinite article), but that the rest of the paragraph it's found in eliminates one of those possible meanings, so from the writing of the text itself, there's only one valid interpretation. That's how disambiguating RAW works. It's not a RAI argument, though the RAI is entirely clear regardless.


It's like if I said pale master lost his vision after level 3 because the text says

"Darkvision (Ex): At 3rd level, the dark begins to lose its mysteries to a pale master, who gains darkvision out to 60 feet. If he already has darkvision, its effective distance increases by 60 feet."

And I said "well at level 3 you get it, but it doesn't say anything about level 4. It's implied in the context."


That's neither grammatically nor semantically equivalent to the issue in question, nor does it make sense in any possible way from the text.



What we have is one grammatically-possible interpretation that fits with the surrounding text from the remainder of its own entry, and fits with the rest of the text within the class description, and one grammatically-possible interpretation that fits with neither, and for some reason you want the second one to be the correct one? You can't read the 'a' phrase in a vacuum and claim it's indisputable RAW.

[AthasianWarlock]

Given that he didn't write the class, and likely didn't do a thorough examination of the class prior to that interview, and additionally given that interviews aren't RAW nor do they particularly inform RAW, I don't see how that has anything to do with the question of what's RAW here.




That's not how grammar works, though... My whole point from my first post here was that the phrase could grammatically mean one of two different things(precisely because of the undefined nature of the indefinite article), but that the rest of the paragraph it's found in eliminates one of those possible meanings, so from the writing of the text itself, there's only one valid interpretation. That's how disambiguating RAW works. It's not a RAI argument, though the RAI is entirely clear regardless.




That's neither grammatically nor semantically equivalent to the issue in question, nor does it make sense in any possible way from the text.



What we have is one grammatically-possible interpretation that fits with the surrounding text from the remainder of its own entry, and fits with the rest of the text within the class description, and one grammatically-possible interpretation that fits with neither, and for some reason you want the second one to be the correct one? You can't read the 'a' phrase in a vacuum and claim it's indisputable RAW.

It isn't ambiguous though. In English the word "a" modifies the word that follows. There are no unclear article antecedents. Indefinite articles indicate that the noun is one of potentially many. The phrase "At first level" is followed by a comma. In general we don't assume paraphrasticly specific clauses with RAW. "At first level" means you get the ability "at first level" we don't get to add "and only at first level". Likewise, when you get an ability which let's you aquire 1 class ability from "a brain" we don't add "and only one brain" because that's not how RAW works.

Regardless, if we did implement your houserule you could still POA, True create, or wish for the brain of an epic ilithid savant with 10 levels of legacy champion to get around the houserule.

You could also just loop eating more savants brains.

[Crichton]

It isn't ambiguous though. In English the word "a" modifies the word that follows. There are no unclear article antecedents. Indefinite articles indicate that the noun is one of potentially many. The phrase "At first level" is followed by a comma. In general we don't assume paraphrasticly specific clauses with RAW. "At first level" means you get the ability "at first level" we don't get to add "and only at first level". Likewise, when you get an ability which let's you aquire 1 class ability from "a brain" we don't add "and only one brain" because that's not how RAW works.

Regardless, if we did implement your houserule you could still POA, True create, or wish for the brain of an epic ilithid savant with 10 levels of legacy champion to get around the houserule.

You could also just loop eating more savants brains.

Perhaps you don't want it to be ambiguous, but it very much is. The phrase "one skill known by a creature whose brain he has consumed" can mean 2 things, in this context. It can mean "one skill known by [one] creature whose brain he has consumed" thus limiting this to a single usage until the class progression allows more usages of it, or it can mean "one skill known by [any] creature whose brain he has consumed" which would allow unlimited gains, one brain at a time with no limit on the number of brains consumed for skill gain.

You're somehow pretending the first usage isn't grammatically valid, but it is, and in fact even without the follow-on sentences that clarify that it's the correct meaning, it's still the more likely of the two meanings:


The verb phrase of the rules text that permits this ability is this: "an illithid savant can acquire X"

What is X? X is "one skill known" By whom? "By a creature whose brain he has consumed" The 'a' phrase that you're depending on to allow your desired unlimited usages is a subordinate descriptor to the actual object of the verb. The thing the rules allow you to gain is "one skill known" "one of the feats" "one class feature" and "one special attack or special quality" (until they specifically allow you to gain more)


IF, and only if, it actually said the words "can acquire one skill known by any creature whose brain he has consumed" THEN it would unambiguously mean what you want it to mean.


As it is, it has a marginally ambiguous phrase, with ALL the surrounding grammatical, textual, table, and statblock case materials supporting one side of the argument, and NONE supporting the other side.


Even without any of that clarifying text, and the agreement of the clarifying table (which again, is RAW-binding unless it's in conflict with the text, which in this case it isn't), the actual grammatical structure of the words here at the very minimum strongly lean towards the restrictive reading, and more probably actually exclude the unlimited reading.


Please, stop re-labeling my proper usage of English grammatical structure as 'houserules.'


And yes, you can loop the eating of more Savant's brains to gain more usages, but only if they haven't already used their allotment, or have used them on features you'd like to gain.

[AthasianWarlock]

I guess I still don't understand. In either case of your usage I would read it to mean I had an ability where everytime I ate a brain I got an ability. I guess it's also weird that in 20 years of playing 3.5 I've never heard of such a novel interpretation, by either players or game designers.

Text also trumps table, and as I mentioned earlier your interpretation is a special case of RAW (ie 1 is a natural number) so the table isn't in conflict. Surrus could have ate 7 other brains, the fact he doesn't mean the class doesn't allow it RAW.

[Crichton]

I guess I still don't understand. In either case of your usage I would read it to mean I had an ability where everytime I ate a brain I got an ability.

I really don't see how you get that from either the rules text or from my posts, but I'll lay it out one more time:

There's 2 possible grammar-legal face-value meanings of the text that is the first sentence of each class feature entry in question(skills, feats, class features, and special qualities - we'll just refer to the skills one here, for simplicity's sake).
One allows you get a skill any time you eat a brain, with no limit on how many brains you can eat to gain skills.
The other allows you to gain one skill from one brain, and after that you can eat as many brains as you want, but will gain nothing from them until you reach the next level threshold where the text tells you you can gain another skill.

The second meaning, the one that limits you, is the one that is in agreement with the rest of the text in the class description, and also in agreement with the class table


I guess it's also weird that in 20 years of playing 3.5 I've never heard of such a novel interpretation, by either players or game designers.

I can't speak to what you have or haven't heard of, but I promise you, this isn't a 'novel' interpretation, it's the face value meaning of the text, and I'm far from the only one who reads it that way.


Text also trumps table, and as I mentioned earlier your interpretation is a special case of RAW (ie 1 is a natural number) so the table isn't in conflict.

Text trumps table IF AND ONLY IF there's a conflict between the two. In this case, there's only a conflict if you try to use the unlimited meaning of the sentences in question, but if you take the limited meaning, the table agrees perfectly with it. That's just one more piece of evidence that the limited reading of things, which again, isn't a houserule or even an interpretation, but rather one of two grammatically possible RAW meanings of the same text, is the correct one. One fits with every other piece of information from the class; the rest of the text in the class entries, the table, the example statblocks, all of it agrees with the limited reading. Only by ignoring those can you make it be unlimited.


Surrus could have ate 7 other brains, the fact he doesn't mean the class doesn't allow it RAW.

No, it doesn't outright ironclad airtight prohibit the possibility, but the fact that we have 2 example statblocks, and they both have exactly the number of brain-gained features that the limited reading would allow them is pretty dang strong circumstantial evidence in support of the limited reading, and doesn't require you to squint at it and ask questions like "gee, why didn't they give Surrus a dozen extra skills and feats, since I'm obstinately clinging to the ambiguous wording that might conceivably make that legal?"



Seriously, you're gonna hinge your entire RAW argument on one tiny ambiguous phrase, when doing so puts you in conflict with the rest of the text of the entry, the class table, AND the statblock examples, when the only other equally-valid grammatical parsing of those same words lines up perfectly with all of those things? I mean, if you can sell that to your DM, good on ya, but don't come trying to tell us all that it's the clear unambiguous RAW of the situation, please. Especially not without bringing some evidence to the discussion. So far the only evidence you've put forth are the two statblocks, which align perfectly with my argument, and not so much with yours, so....

[AthasianWarlock]

I really don't see how you get that from either the rules text or from my posts, but I'll lay it out one more time:

There's 2 possible grammar-legal face-value meanings of the text ...
The other allows you to gain one skill from one brain, and after that you can eat as many brains as you want, but will gain nothing from them until you reach the next level threshold where the text tells you you can gain another skill.

How? Here's the whole text:

"Acquire Skill (Ex): At 1st level, an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain he has consumed, chosen at the time of consumption. He permanently gains all of the creature's ranks in that skill (but not racial or ability score bonuses to the skill modifier) even if his new total is more ranks than the illithid savant's current character level would normally allow. This skill becomes a class skill for the illithid savant, and he may buy more ranks in the skill if the new ranks do not cause him to exceed his maximum ranks in the skill.

At 4th, 6th, and 8th level, the illithid savant can acquire and use one additional skill from a brain."

So in line 1 it says you gain an ability from a brain you eat. The first phrase indicates you get this ability at level 1. Line two then specifies that this is an exception to the existing rule on max skill ranks per level. Line 3 says this skill is now also a class skill. The last line says that at higher levels instead of the one skill from a brain mentioned in the first line, it's now 2,3,4 respectively.

I don't see it. Also, fwiw I'm a native English speaker. I don't see anything in here about a Max or cap (like we do with manuvers or power points).

[rediridesence]

How? Here's the whole text:

"Acquire Skill (Ex): At 1st level, an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain he has consumed, chosen at the time of consumption. He permanently gains all of the creature's ranks in that skill (but not racial or ability score bonuses to the skill modifier) even if his new total is more ranks than the illithid savant's current character level would normally allow. This skill becomes a class skill for the illithid savant, and he may buy more ranks in the skill if the new ranks do not cause him to exceed his maximum ranks in the skill.

At 4th, 6th, and 8th level, the illithid savant can acquire and use one additional skill from a brain."


if i read this right, you dont even get abilitys from brains. you get the beings skill ranks (such as hide or spot,etc) and at certain class levels you can get more then one skill (such as use magic device & disguise simultaneously..) there is nothing there that even mentions gaining EX, SU, or SP abilities...

i assume you mean the level 5 class ability? that does seem to have restrictions on it though:
"special attack or special quality"
"The chosen ability must not rely on a physical feature of the consumed creature"

[Crichton]

How? Here's the whole text:

"Acquire Skill (Ex): At 1st level, an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain he has consumed, chosen at the time of consumption. He permanently gains all of the creature's ranks in that skill (but not racial or ability score bonuses to the skill modifier) even if his new total is more ranks than the illithid savant's current character level would normally allow. This skill becomes a class skill for the illithid savant, and he may buy more ranks in the skill if the new ranks do not cause him to exceed his maximum ranks in the skill.

At 4th, 6th, and 8th level, the illithid savant can acquire and use one additional skill from a brain."

So in line 1 it says you gain an ability from a brain you eat. The first phrase indicates you get this ability at level 1. Line two then specifies that this is an exception to the existing rule on max skill ranks per level. Line 3 says this skill is now also a class skill. The last line says that at higher levels instead of the one skill from a brain mentioned in the first line, it's now 2,3,4 respectively.

I don't see it. Also, fwiw I'm a native English speaker. I don't see anything in here about a Max or cap (like we do with manuvers or power points).


Yes, you've very deftly parsed out ONE of the two grammatically valid readings of that text, but you seem to have completely missed the other, equally grammatically-valid reading of it (it's actually a slightly more valid reading, given the technicalities of grammatical structure and subordinate modifying phrases, but not only is that a fruitless thing to argue about, it typically matters very little in common speech, where things like grammatical structure and semantics are almost always used pretty loosely)

Your reading of the text equates to "Whenever you consume a creature's brain, you can acquire one skill known by that creature"




Let's break down the sentence in question, so you can see how the structure works and maybe at least concede that there's another possible reading of the same words:


At 1st level - We can ignore this phrase, as it's neither ambiguous, nor relevant to the part that's in question

an illithid savant can acquire one skill - This is the heart of the sentence, and contains the Subject, Verb, and Object, or more precisely, it contains the Subject and the Verb Phrase, which itself is comprised of the Verb and the Object

known by a creature whose brain he has consumed - this is a Prepositional Phrase, which by definition is a subordinate modifier, in this case subordinate to the noun that is the 'head' of the Object of the sentence - 'one skill' (strictly speaking, since this is composed of several other nested phrases, we could break it apart even further into constituent elements, but not in any way that would change this discussion, so let's not, for the sake of clarity)


chosen at the time of consumption. - we can also ignore this part, as it too is neither ambiguous nor relevant to the part in question



What we see when we break the sentence down into it's parts is that the actual rule is that you 'can acquire one skill'



You're reading the text as if it said "an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by [each] creature whose brain you have consumed"

I'm reading the text to say "At 1st level an illithid savant can acquire one skill[,] known by a creature whose brain he has consumed. At 4th, 6th, and 8th level, the illithid savant can acquire and use one additional skill from [another creature whose] brain [he consumes]."

(As per journalistic/writing convention, I've used [] brackets to indicate changes or clarifying additions to the actual original text, to indicate the differences in the two readings of the same text)



Both are valid readings of the same text, from a grammatical standpoint. But only my reading aligns with the rest of the data available. I see now that you seem to think that the 'one additional X' statements are supposed to actually allow you to gain more than one X from each brain. I'm not gonna take the time to break that down, but it would make the statblock examples even MORE contradictory of your position than they were before, since not only would the example creatures be able to have more than they do, but you'd expect them to have MUCH MUCH more than they do, since they wouldn't be gaining features at a paltry rate of one feature per brain. They'd literally have to, over and over, go 'I'm gonna eat this Wiz20, but I'm ONLY gonna gain his spellcasting, but no other features' and so on.



The thing with actual ambiguity, whether it be lexical ambiguity (different possible meanings for the same word) or in this case, grammatical ambiguity (different valid meanings for the same grammatical structure of the same words), is that both meanings could be just as validly 'RAW' since they're both valid meanings of the actual same text. The only way to determine which is 'more RAW' (for lack of a better term), is to see which fits better with the other, equally rules-binding text and tables around them in the same rules entry (in this case, the rest of the class description entries for IS), and if that fails, to check them with less-binding things like example statblocks, and if that fails, to fall back on checking them against established structures/conventions/etc that the rules use elsewhere.


Also, and at the risk of conveying snark that I sincerely don't intend, fwiw, I too am a native English speaker, and one with a Master's level education in research linguistics. :) (wouldn't have brought it up if you hadn't, friend)



if i read this right, you dont even get abilitys from brains. you get the beings skill ranks (such as hide or spot,etc) and at certain class levels you can get more then one skill (such as use magic device & disguise simultaneously..) there is nothing there that even mentions gaining EX, SU, or SP abilities...

i assume you mean the level 5 class ability? that does seem to have restrictions on it though:
"special attack or special quality"
"The chosen ability must not rely on a physical feature of the consumed creature"


Indeed we have been using the 'skills from brains' entry as a sort of shorthand to indicate all 4 of the IS's class features that grant X for consuming a creature's brain. All of those class feature entries are structured enough alike to share the same ambiguity which is causing the question at hand, so to avoid needless confusion and even bigger walls of text than we already had, we just used the skill entry text, when really referring to all of them as a whole.

[AthasianWarlock]

chosen at the time of consumption. - we can also ignore this part, as it too is neither ambiguous nor relevant to the part in question


No, this is relevant, because you can consume more than once. This is what you seem to be ignoring. So the ability above triggers multiple times. In other words, the actual rule is that you 'can acquire one skill when you consume a brain'

You are saying this yourself


"At 1st level an illithid savant can acquire one skill[,] known by a creature whose brain he has consumed. At 4th, 6th, and 8th level, the illithid savant can acquire and use one additional skill from [another creature whose] brain [he consumes]."


The comma does not appear in the text. On the other hand

"an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain you have consumed"

is in the text. Is it common in reading RAW from a linguistics perspective to assume punctuation that isn't present? This is the first time I have seen such a technique in reading anything.

[Crichton]

No, this is relevant, because you can consume more than once. This is what you seem to be ignoring. So the ability above triggers multiple times.

It's not relevant in any way to whether or not you can consume more than once, though. It only specifies the time at which you must choose which of the creature's skills you wish to gain: you must choose at the time you are consuming, not before, not after, and that choice has no relevance to whether later consumptions of later creatures will gain you more skills.



In other words, the actual rule is that you 'can acquire one skill when you consume a brain'


That's a pretty accurate re-statement of what I clearly said was your choice of interpretations of the rule, but it's not the actual text of the rule.







The comma does not appear in the text.

On the other hand

"an illithid savant can acquire one skill known by a creature whose brain you have consumed"

is in the text. Is it common in reading RAW from a linguistics perspective to assume punctuation that isn't present? This is the first time I have seen such a technique in reading anything.

I'm guessing you skimmed and didn't actually read my post, since otherwise you'd have seen this line immediately following the text you're attempting to poke fun at me for:


(As per journalistic/writing convention, I've used [] brackets to indicate changes or clarifying additions to the actual original text, to indicate the differences in the two readings of the same text)


The comma, as well as any other addition or change to the text, was marked with to indicate that they were there to add clarification.

[B]I literally quoted the exact text of the rule twice, with [bracketed] changes to illustrate the two possible readings of the text, first your taken meaning, then mine.




The only thing I'm confused about is whether you just disagree with my analysis, or whether you fail to understand (or refuse to acknowledge) how the text could be read in any manner other than your own preconceived notion. I've stated both sides, yours and mine, and made both RAW-textual and logical arguments in support of my own, but haven't seen any such from your side. Saying you don't agree isn't an argument in favor of your position, friend.

[Remuko]

I think this is much simpler than all of that. Nearly every ability of every class is either uses per day, or at will etc. If it could be used more than once, it would say so, explicitly. It only maybe says you can, implicitly. RAI it seems very clear that youre only able to do it once. If you could consume multiple brains it would say "this has unlimited uses" or at will or some other language.

[Zanos]

Unspecified is unlimited use. Believe it says so in the MM or maybe the RC, but most abilities do not in fact specify a number of uses and default to unlimited.